The Politics of Blame

Abstract

Historian Paolo Favero argues that the “brava gente” myth, which promotes an image of Italians as intrinsically benevolent, “good folk,” has become a cleansing agent used to remove all the stains of Italy’s past.1 The myth first came into existence during Italy’s era of colonization and has since been applied to whitewash evidence of Italian racism, imperialism, xenophobia, Fascism, antisemitism, and war crimes.2

Keywords

German Citizen Public Memory Jewish Refugee Western Ally Italian Police

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